the state of journalism today

a couple years back, i flew out to syracuse for final round interviews of the newhouse fellowship. all six finalists received full rides to the j-school, but the two fellowship winners would also get their choice of which newhouse paper to be staffed at post-graduation.

the interview ran the weekend. and after the three days, it became starkly clear i was the second best candidate. hemmy, a korean girl from nyc via houston, was the best. funny thing, neither of us was chosen.

not that it mattered to her, since she landed a spot in la times METPRO program -- a year interning as a general assignment reporter at the times followed by a year on staff of another tribune newspaper (the south florida sun-sentinel in her case).

sometime between her time in la and fort lauderdale we drifted apart. the one time we did speak to her during the florida exile, she told me that she hated it there, at least partly because she was doing the long-distance thing with someone back in la. as soon as she finished her second year, she wanted to return to california.

now she's back. only not as a journalist, but as a lawyer at a boutique law firm.

i don't have her cv handy, but here are some of her highlights. undergrad at rice. nyu law school. couple years at a fancy nyc firm. a year at the poughkeepsie journal. a year at the la times. a year at the sun-sentinel. just published an essay in a book of blind-date horror stories. terrific storyteller. conversant in korean.

i often say journalism sucks. i say this because the only jobs within reach for me require a move to some piece of shit, redneck town in the midwest for 18k a year. i'd love work as a full-time journalist. but the love isn't strong enough to make that sacrifice. not when i can do interesting things in sf for a lot more money.

but if she can't get a job back in la, then journalism doesn't just suck -- it's fucked. this is a girl who had the wherewithal to leave a lucrative gig in nyc to move to poughkeepsie so she could make 10% as much and write. and now with three years as a full-time reporter, she can't find a single reporting job in la. as a korean, no less, in a town with a whole bunch of koreans. for any number of publications that are starving for diversity. yes, i know the state of the industry. but driving young talent away certainly won't turn the balance sheets upside-down.

i'm happy she's back in la. it gives me someone to go see a show in la with when i'm down there. and she's got a great job paying good money.

but i'm sad she's not back as a writer.

it's official

i'm up-to-date on the posnanski blog.

my hangover just got worse. the sun disappeared behind the clouds. a frigid wind started blowing off the water. blah, blah, blah. this sucks.

now what, work?

the end is near

approaching the fifth and final season of the wire, i experienced a peculiar mixture of excitement and dread. excitement, obviously, because the greatest thing to ever grace the small screen was set to return and fill that huge void. dread because each episode meant one less new episode in this world.

now i am experiencing something similar again. baseball is an odd animal for me. while i enjoy the occasional game, i enjoy reading about it much more. and no baseball writer do i enjoy more than joe posnanski. i've known about joe for some time. i've loyally read rob neyer for some time and he periodically would mention joe along with the moniker 'best sports writer out there'.

but it's only been more recently, that i've become a devoted reader. for a while, i would read whenever he posted something new on his blog. but after reading great take after great take, i decided i needed to cull through the archives. essentially, it's been my work day for the past week or so.

the archives date back to october of last year, but now i'm just about caught up to april. and since i started regularly reading the blog in april, i know the stockpile of new material nears complete depletion.

good news for my employers. but, oh the dread for me...

more evidence time flies

every so often, i head back to blogger, type a few words, and hit submit. voila. a blog entry. it's not regular, so before seeing the date of my last post, i really have no idea how much time has passed since i last wrote.

the only consistent thing: it's always a lot longer than i thought.

apparently, it's been three weeks since i last made a contribution. yet to me, it seems like yesterday. if i were explaining this phenomenon to a strange girl, i'd say it like this (sarcastically, perhaps).

'writing is personal. every word you put down stays with you.'

and like most things men say to strange girls, they're not really true. it's not a lie either, but you being clever gets more priority than you being accurate. after all, if she's a girl, and she's strange -- and you're talking to her -- you're likely considering the possibility of taking her home. given this, witty plays much better than knowledgeable. much, much, better.

in reality, writing is hard. i suspect hard for everybody. and certainly hard for me. humans have an unlimited capacity for easy. that's why places like cheesecake factory and walmart proliferate like adolescent bunnies despite sucking. hard, on the other hand, happens far less often. yet understandably, they stay with you longer. we humans like the idea we conquer great challenges constantly. hence, three weeks between blog postings feeling like three hours.